Thursday, February 02, 2012

Below the Radar: The Race to Bring Gas to Liquids to the Well Head

With record lows in the natural gas markets, companies are offering natural gas assets at very attractive pricing. "We want to demonstrate the enormous potential in stranded North American gas reserves; that will only be possible when industry understands the market potential in converting those reserves to liquids at the surface. Currently the industry focus is finding and developing natural gas liquids below ground, but few really understand the financial potential unlocked by small scale conversion of existing gas to liquids with GasTechno above ground," says Walter Breidenstein, [Gas Technologies] CEO. "Our industry studies have been completed and all the economic and technical models are developed. Our goal in the Early Adopter Program is to open up our expertise and demonstrate what we have proven over the last several years in this growing sector." _Marketwatch

A third mini-GTL maker is moving into the "early adoption" phase. Gas Technologies is bringing its "Gas Techno" mini-GTL to 7 preferred customers for early adoption and trial. Gas Technologies joins Oxford Catalysts / Velocys, and CompactGTL in the race to bring miniature gas to liquids to currently undervalued stranded gas resources.

GasTechno's focus is the conversion and monetization of flared or stranded natural gas. The company is also evaluating and developing processes for methanol-to-diesel (MTD), methanol-to-gasoline (MTG), methanol-to-jet fuel, methanol-to-olefins (MTO), glycols, amines, fertilizers and other bolt-on processes that provide exceptional ROIs and high profit margins. Securing a "flare to fuels" partner with similar interests is a high priority for the program. Operators with gas resources at landfills and biodigesters are also targeted.

...Deploying a GasTechno plant on stranded reserves converts stranded gas to liquid product that sells at market prices trending well above pipeline prices. By converting and marketing stranded reserves at improved pricing, this strategy has the potential to improve asset valuations at more than 5 to 10 times by exploiting provisions in the modernized SEC oil and gas reporting requirements that permit the use of "alternative product pricing" to value proven reserves.
_Marketwatch

This general technology is also applicable in part to biomass to liquids (BTL) and coal to liquids (CTL). In other words, scalable production of high value liquid fuels and chemicals from inexpensive feedstocks, is rapidly coming within reach of more and more enterprises.

Consider what the global energy marketplace will look like, when even small communities can afford to own and operate their own small-scale fuels and chemicals refinery, using whatever abundant feedstock is closest or more affordable?